My initial thoughts having spent a couple of hours in it. Do bear in mind that the first 15 mins was just setting up the controls and getting a feel for the inside, both front and back).
- Crashes the game completely when you open the kneeboard. Somewhat annoying, but probably an easy fix, so not a big deal. My guess is that it’ll get fixed in the next week.
- Looks utterly stunning. The various developers just seem to keep pushing the boundaries on just how stunning some aircraft look, I assume as they learn new “tricks” on how best to use the game engine and it’s lighting. Both the F14 and Mig19 look amazing
- It’s a VERY analogue feeling aircraft. No fly by wire system and pretty primitive electronic. The displays are clearly cathode ray tubes and they’ve even modelled the low refresh rate of the head up display. It feels positively vintage when compared to the F18. If anything, when I first started looking around the pilot’s seat, almost felt Russian with the seeming number of buttons and dials. It was only afterwards that it struck me that no it’s not Russian, as the panel layouts seem to have been thought about and are in logically grouped areas, unlike some Russian aircraft, which seem to start with grouping, then realise they’ve missed a bunch, and haphazardly throw them into random blank spaces.
- Relatively straightforward to take off, once it’s been started, though clearly it needs a good deal more manual handling than the far more automated F18. For that matter, landing wasn’t that difficult either.
- Start up from “cold” is going to take some practice. There’s quite convoluted and complex process to start. It will be MUCH easier when I can bring up a kneeboard to check what’s next to do. Hence why I didn’t focus on that last night.
- It’s FAST. With no afterburner, it was happily cruising just about mach 1 when on full military power and the wings swept back. Most aircraft struggle to do that. Haven’t tried any real speed tests yet. Assuming it’s inline with reality (which it should be), the rate of climb was only on par with the F18 due to the additional weight of the F14. Making up for that, the F14 has a good deal more outright power and better aero. So it’s max speed is something like 0.7 mach faster, which is a BIG difference. Also has greater range due to bigger tanks.
- They’ve done something new in DCS, which is to provide an automated “AI” (don’t really like calling it that, as it’s just well scripted) RIO (back seat). No other aircraft currently has this, although some of the other aircraft allow players to sit in the 2nd seat (which can also be done in the F14). I have to say that I had some serious doubts about this last year, as I could see it just being a big mess, being new functionality. In practice, seems to work extremely well. They’ve had a real pilot “voice” the responses to your requests and to warnings and similar. So when close to the ground, he’ll warn you, and when you ask for him to do something (e.g. re-tune the radio), he’ll let you know once finished. They’ve even included “checklists” with him, so I believe he’ll talk you though the cold start procedure. Whilst I expected this to be the biggest risk and probable “let down”, they’ve really done an amazing job on the RIO capability and it’s brill.
In summary, it’s highly “characterful”, is going to require some real learning to get the best from it, has some unique capabilities (probably one of the best interceptors in game, despite it’s age), looks amazing and I see being a pleasure to fly regularly.
So for me, I'm a very happy bunny!
